Large attendance and unveiling of major news made Rail Europe’s “RIDE 2012″ a great success

RIDE 2012 (Rail Europe’s International Distribution Event) took place in Paris last 20th & 21st March and brought together the 150 key experts and decision-makers within international distribution of railways products including Australia’s Rich Leonard Manager, Rail Europe Australasia, David Stafford, CEO Rail Plus, Julia Leary, Marketing and Product Manager Infinity Rail and Angelo Gaetani,General Manager CIT. "RIDE 2012 went extremely well, and we are happy to have offered such a memorable event to our partners and to further raise the profile of International Rail Distribution", declared Pierre-Stéphane Austi, CEO of Rail Europe.

RIDE offes rail carriers a unique forum and we had some significant announcements regards launch of key products including:.

– the "German Rail Pass Extension", Deutsche Bahn’s new product, which allows German Rail Pass holders to travel outside of Germany on DB international trains and buses
– Italo, the new high speed rail service in Italy operated by NTV
– Trenitalia’s new classes of service on the "FrecciaRossa" high speed trains, offering ultimate choice and comfort

Complementing product launches, the announcement of the imminent signature of direct agreements with Trenitalia and Deutsche Bahn was the highlight of the event and acclimated by all Rail Europe GSAs. Thanks to these agreements, allowing direct connections between distribution systems, Rail Europe will indeed enjoy complete access to the whole fare range of the two rail leaders, in real time. After the signature of direct agreements/connexions with Renfe, ATOC, Amtrak or VIA Rail, Rail Europe completes its portfolio of products with access to 2 major inventories.

Marc Giesen, Director of International Sales for Deutsche Bahn indicated: "RIDE 2012 was for Deutsche Bahn a very productive event. Content was insightful and interactions were highly qualitative. We were happy to reaffirm the strength of our strong partnership with Rail Europe, which our direct agreement and the direct connexion between our systems will only further reinforce in the coming months".

"After such a successful event, where both rail carriers and GSAs reaffirmed their commitment towards growing our common business… let’s already stop the date to meet again, in 2014, for the next edition of RIDE!" added Pierre-Stéphane Austi.

Rail Europe is the #1 distributor of rail tickets and passes in the world, selling in Australasia through Rail Plus, Infinity Rail, Rail Tickets, CIT or Go Holidays (NZ).

* The main railways from Europe and North America were represented at RIDE, including national railways such as SNCF (France), SBB (Switzerland), Deutsche Bahn (Germany), Trenitalia (Italy), Renfe (Spain), NS (Netherlands), SJ (Sweden), Amtrak (USA) and Via Rail (Canada) as well as international carriers like Eurostar, Thalys, TGV Lyria, Società Viaggiatori Italia, City Night Line or Elipsos. Representatives of STS -Swiss Travel System-, the Eurail Group, NTV (Nuovo Trasporto Viaggiatori – Italy) and ATOC (for Train Operating Companies in the UK) were also present at RIDE 2012.